Author, Willie Drye (10-9-20)
WILLIE DRYE, an author and hurricane expert from North Carolina, stopped by to discuss his latest release, "Storm of the Century: The Labor Day Hurricane of 1935".
From the "PR by the Book" Website: https://prbythebook.com/experts/willie-drye/
"In 1934, in the middle of the Great Depression, hundreds of jobless WWI veterans were sent to the remote Florida Keys on a government work program to build a highway from Miami to Key West. The Roosevelt Administration was making a genuine effort to help these down-and-out vets, many of whom suffered from what is known today as post-traumatic stress disorder. But the attempt to help them turned into a tragedy.
The supervisors in charge of the veterans misunderstood the danger posed by hurricanes in the low-lying Florida Keys. In late August 1935, a small stealthy tropical storm crossed the Bahamas, causing little damage. When it entered the Straits of Florida, however, it exploded into one of the most powerful hurricanes on record. At that time, the U.S. Weather Bureau forecasters could only make an educated guess at its exact position, and their calculations tragically ended up being off the mark.
The hurricane that struck the Upper Florida Keys on the evening of September 2, 1935, is still the most powerful hurricane to make landfall in the United States.Supervisors waited too long to call for an evacuation train from Miami to move the vets out of harm’s way. The train was slammed by the storm surge and winds exceeding 180 mph soon after it reached Islamorada. Only the 160-ton locomotive was left upright on the tracks. About 400 veterans were left unprotected in flimsy work camps and approximately 260 of them were killed. This book is their story, revised and expanded with new information and stories of some of the heroes of the Labor Day 1935 calamity."
Enjoy!